Christiaan Nagel

Christiaan Nagel is a South African born/Britishstreet artist known for his over-sized mushroom sculptures made from Polyurethanewhich he places high up on buildings.They stretch as far as London, New York, Barcelona, Berlin, Cape Town, Los Angeles, Sydney and Melbourne.

In 2007 Christiaan was invited to do his first UK solo exhibition at Conningsby Gallery in Goodge Street, London featuring his splash-paint works on airbrushed canvasses.

In 2009 the first unsolicited mushroom went up at Old Street roundabout with the help of two helpers who subsequently became know as “Ze Germans”.

“It was after the trill of this first installation that I went on to buy a whole pallet of expanding foam cans. These 1000 cans lasted me two years and that was the first big wave of mushroom installations around London’s east end”.

In 2014 Christiaan built and installed his first MegaMushroom at Urban Spree in Berlin. It stands 7 meters tall.

In 2017 Nagel acquired the trademark EXPAND YOUR MIND® which he says is the essence to his work.

Christiaan’s original works can now be found in private collections. These include works in Bronze. Christiaan also has a popular Mini Mushroom range.

“I am an avid chess player, so it was an easy “yes” for me to participate in this project.

Over the mushroom years I’ve developed various forms of these mushrooms including the Warhol referenced screen-print-style mushroom, which you can see in the squares of the chess board.

I believe in life-long learning. Our minds are the only barriers to endless possibilities and ideas. Hence my logo, EXPAND YOUR MIND® .

I am a great fan of the ideas of Richard Feynman in seeing the world from a different point of view. But, my greatest influence to date is probably Charlie Munger, including his; 25 standard causes of human misjudgement.

EXPAND YOUR MIND® was inspired by his ideas on developing a latticework of Mental Models.

Go check it out. Expand your mind…”

Christiaan Nagel

We are delighted to be able to offer a bespoke service for our Art games. If you would like to enquire further about commissioning Christiaan Nagel to create a unique hand-painted Art Chess, Backgammon, Checkers or Chutes/Snakes & Ladders set specially for you, please get in touch via our Contact Form below.